Ring emerged around the same time as Webcore and Another Green World (search for material by these bands on this site), and became firm Club Dog favorites with their Hawkwind / Cardiacs like material. The band got to headline the first night at a new venue for Club Dog, The Sir George Robey in Finsbury Park, London, N4.
Ring also played plenty of times at the old Club Dog venue in Wood Green, London, N22.
Note our very own Tony D on the lineup for October 9th!
The first demo was released in 1984 via Gogg’s B.B.P. cassette label, this cassette label dealt mainly with Anarcho Punk releases by bands like The Apostles, check out the B.B.P. site in links. It was a pleasant surprise to see the first demo released but I feel that this second cassette release is the superior of the two.
anon
January 27, 2008 at 10:19 pmthere is a third tape called nervous recreation which i’ve not heard but is apparently even more cardiacs sounding. Cheers for this and all the other great posts, sad to see “land speed sonic” calling it quits, I would have loved to see/hear what else was in that collection, but at least I can come hear for some obscure long since lost/borrowed/stolen memories
gerard
January 27, 2008 at 10:54 pmFlowers ITD played a gig with Ring and Toms Midnight Garden once in Norwood or somewhere like that (too many places like that unfortunately 🙂
Ian from Ring then moved to Brighton and joined / formed (…dunno) the fantastic Mutagen, who produced some wonderful stuff in or around the acid house era.
Then, as a simple twist of fate would have it, I rang a ‘man and his van’ advert number to move me back from Brighton to London in ’89 and it was the man himself! We ended up stopping in Selsdon for lunch with Ian’s parents!
A fond memory of a lovely man.
Graham Burnett
May 5, 2008 at 6:40 pmI saw Ring play live at some squatted street festival next to the old Ambulance station in the Old Kent Road circa 1986 – if memory serves well it was the day after a Conflict gig at Woolwich Polytechnic – bit of a lost weekend for me – before the Conflict gig we’d gone to a ‘punx picnic’ thing in Greenwich park – however we were late and it seemed the punks had all been evicted by the cops – never the less we (Southend crew) decided to have our own picnic next to the Meridian marker with loads of beer & cider we’d brought along and Rick Prevost (later of Kuru) decided to start a camp fire, so consequently we got evicted as well… I remember having this argument with this policewoman, this absolutely gorgeous sunset was taking place right behind her, but she was refusing to turn around and look at it, presumably this would have undermined her authority in some way, and I was getting really wound up, “why can’t you just turn your head round for 2 seconds and appreciate the beauty of nature?” and her threatening to nick me if I didn’t shut up… Surreal! Wonder what the charge would have been? ‘Did willfully encourage an appointed officer of the law to unproductively use her timeby apreciating a natural phenomenum’…
Then we ended up at some party at the 121 in railton road with these dodgy punks from Brixton who had a big dog and had been threatening ‘casuals’ on the bus from Woolwich… Next day woke up in some strange flat in Brixton and made our way to the Ring gig in the Old Kent Road.
The night after the Ring gig we then ended up at a party in Arsenal with the London Greenpeace crew including the likes of Helen Steele & Dave Morris and Gary Waffle (RIP), it was some squat eviction party and this bloke called Mick encouraged us to eat this bloke’s, who was asleep, bread. He neglected to tell us that the bloke was actually a psycopath and when he woke up and said “Wheres my fucking bread???” Mick pointed us out and said “They ate it”, and he chased us down the road with a big knife which Mick seemed to find most amusing. Apparently he was well known for being something of a wind-up merchant, maybe others here know him???
Anyway, yes, Ring, enjoyed them, reminded me of a sort of cross between Gong and Hawkwind, early precursors of Ozric Tentacles and the like?? I used to have a couple of their tapes, dunno what happened to them???
Roger Jolly
January 10, 2009 at 6:29 pmI have a rip of Nervous Recreation (the third tape), I’ll see about getting it up here as soon as possible
Roger Jolly
January 11, 2009 at 9:38 amThere’s actually some great shots of the band on the Zag & the Coloured Beads website.. http://www.zatcb.co.uk/Ringfinal.html
To date this is probably the most complete & best page on Ring that I’ve found.
I’m hoping soon to get the Nervous Recreation uploaded properly with the tracks nicely edited and cover.. all that jazz (or in this case alarming pointy pronk)
Graham Burnett
March 24, 2010 at 9:14 pmMick from the above referred to party in Arsenal circa 1986 has been in touch with me to point out that he actually felt very embarrassed by the incident I’ve recounted, and that in no way was it his intention for events to unfold as they did, and that he was never ‘a wind up merchant’. He also feels that I’ve poorly reflected on the person that he is and who he was at that time by making it appear as if he engineered the situation I described. I’d therefore like to take this opportunity to publicly and unreservedly apologise to him for the offence I’ve caused to him. Sorry Mick.
jb latham
May 23, 2010 at 8:39 pmI saw Ring at the Clarendon and have a band photograph. The nervous recreation tape is very good. I dont have the other ones.
Dave
December 4, 2017 at 9:56 amHappy Days.. I was a Bad Tune Man…used to play with Ring and the Cardiacs. Hope everybody is happy..Is every body happy?!